The Hawthorn Football Club, an AFL club that actively promotes its association with Beyond Blue, is accused of unlawfully discriminating against an employee after she was hospitalised with a critical mental illness. | EXCLUSIVE
The Hawthorn Football Club, an AFL club that actively promotes its association with Beyond Blue, is accused of unlawfully discriminating against an employee after she was hospitalised with a critical mental illness
“I think that the club decided pretty much after hospital, in my view, that I was too hard to manage, and it was easier just to push me out,” she said. “We regard the physical and mental health and safety of all our employees as our number one priority,” he said. “This has been paramount in our dealings with Ms Salmon-Abbott with the club repeatedly offering support and assistance to accommodate her circumstances.”In documents lodged on Sunday with the human rights division of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, Salmon-Abbott says she was first approached by Hawthorn shortly after Christmas 2020 about working for the club.
Salmon-Abbott says that after she was discharged from hospital, she requested a gradual return to work, starting with one day a week. Her dispute with Hawthorn, which is already the subject of failed mediation, centres on whether the club genuinely tried to accommodate this. According to Salmon-Abbott’s statement of claim, this was detrimental conduct in breach of Victoria’s Equal Opportunity Act.Salmon-Abbott claims that from July 5, 2021, through to the end of the year, she was on unpaid leave and not permitted to return to work. She has now quit the club and taken a new job with a large consultancy firm.Michael Wilson
Asked why she is pursuing the case against Hawthorn – the club she grew up barracking for – Salmon Abbott says she was disappointed to leave the sports industry and more disappointed in Hawthorn, which every year plays an AFL match for the Beyond Blue Cup, an event intended to “shine a light on mental health” and reduced the stigma associated with mental illness.
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